On Monday, I'm off to China to conduct a project assessment visit. The Salvation Army NZ have been working in Inner Mongolia for a few years now, and the project we are involved in now is outlined here.
Xinghe County, situated in Inner Mongolia is home to a population of about 296,000 people. Persistent droughts, overgrazing and deforestation have resulted in serious soil erosion, this has lead to a sharp decline in productivity from the land resulting in poverty for the traditional mountain farmers. (Approximately 28% of the rural population lives in extreme poverty, with less than NZD120.00 annual net income per capita ($0.33 per day).
The mountainous nature of the county and the scattered population makes it difficult for the government to provide basic health, education, electricity, water, information distribution and administration to much of the county.
The Xinghe Integrated Immigration Scheme is part of the China National Northwest Development Programme to restore exhausted mountain and hill country by relocating the people and replanting the hillsides in forests and allowing these areas to return to their natural state. The Scheme has resettled about 900 families from thirteen inaccessible mountainous villages to the town of Xinghe.
Under the scheme, the government offers each of the families to be resettled an 18m2 brick house with water and electricity connected on a 800m2 yard together with a small shed to house animals. Some families have managed to purchase sufficient bricks to build a high perimeter wall around their yard so they can keep their property safe and keep a few animals such as chickens, goats or sheep, or a cow.
The Salvation Army’s part in this scheme is to provide the social infrastructure for the new immigrants to assist them in building a community in an urban environment. The Government has leased to The Salvation Army, long term, 35 acres of land adjacent to the new settlement. On this land The Salvation Army have built a multifunctional community centre, a training centre, accommodation for staff and officers, and a demonstration training farm. Regular farm training is being provided to teach basic animal husbandry and horticulture technology. At the local primary school, less than 500 metres from the village, TSA has also funded the building of two new blocks of four classrooms to accommodate the children at the school.
The resettlement has broken up extended family households with the older generation being resettled in different cities. The immigrants come from two major ethnic groups, (13% Mongolian, 87% Han) and unrelated villages so few know other members of the village. Life in the rural communities is harsh, with no work for the women. Many of the young women do not want to marry the mountain men as they have to live in the home with the husband’s parents. The new wife becomes the worker for the husband’s mother. Many men have “bought” wives from the illegal human trafficking agents. Life is so hard for the purchased wife that, in many cases, she has deserted leaving the children in the care of the husband and his parents. A number of the immigrant women in the new village were purchased as brides and they have very few skills, vocational training or literacy. Their options in life are very limited.
While the living conditions in the new village are better than the mountain villages, there is no drainage system, rubbish collection, no private or public washrooms and only one toilet block per 50 households. These toilet blocks are semi enclosed structures with a concrete slab floor. Human waste is just left on the floor. At some stage someone shovels the human waste into an open pit behind the toilet block.
The new village has no social or community amenities and very little sense of community. This project will be part of The Salvation Army’s work to provide health, hygiene, literacy, vocational, family relationships and community development training options for women and to provide these women with the capacity to build a new and better community in this village.
